District officials to interview two candidates who could fill both math and football coach openings in Bay

District officials will interview two candidates this week, either of whom could fill the open math teacher position as well as the vacant Bay High School head football coach post.

Superintendent Clint Keener said Friday one of the candidates is from within the district and the other is from outside the district.

“Both could do both jobs,” Keener said. “They’re qualified in both areas.”

Keener has said from the beginning of the search for a new head football coach that the ideal situation for the district would be to find someone who can fill both positions. Currently, the district only has one open teaching position – the math teacher’s job. Keener has said his educational philosophy as superintendent is that he does not like to create teaching positions just to bring in an athletics coach. He said if that person later leaves the coaching position, a district would still have to maintain the teaching position which was created for that person.

Keener said there was a third candidate from outside the district who could fill both positions, but that person withdrew his name from contention.

“He decided to stay where he was at,” Keener said.

Keener said the interviews this week should help clarify how close the district is to getting a new head coach. He said the district would still like to get the new coach in place as quickly as possible.

A group of football team parents and supporters was again at the March 24 school board meeting expressing their support for getting the best possible candidate. They also said they would like to have as much information and transparency as possible in the process, with some questioning whether they were receiving sufficient information about the process.

Keener noted that there were two community representatives on the search committee. He said they had selected 14 names and interviewed candidates, and that he would forward qualifications criteria that some community members did not know. He also reminded the audience that he could not discuss candidates publicly as part of the interview process and that it was not a good idea for committee members to do so either.